Sabah and Sarawak must build strong bond now than ever..

KOTA KINABALU - Opposition political parties of Sabah based must be seen as one group and one force if it were to win people’s hearts to face the next General Election. Second, the path where the group is heading to must be clearly seen, and the move by Sabah and Sarawak must be in tandem in their demand for full autonomy based on Malaysian Agreement 1963. Thirdly, the networking of the two Borneo States must take place at various levels according Amde Sidik, the Director of PIPPA-Progressive Institute of Public Policy Analysis Sabah.

In Sarawak’s case the autonomy has been practised slightly ahead of Sabah. Sarawak State is in control of the appointment of its Chief Minister, unlike Sabah where Prime Minister who decides, this is because Sabah is controlled by UMNO, whose chief is the Prime Minister, not only that, every other appointments and policy matters and directions need to have UMNO Chief ‘s blessings.

“Sarawak way would be aspiration for Sabah political movement now. The past and the current Chief Minsters of Sarawak have made it clear time and time again, if the autonomy of the State is to be safeguarded, Peninsula Party in particular UMNO has no place in Sarawak, who else can inspire Sabah better” Amde said.

In the recent two seminars held in Kuching, where two groups of Sabah politicians and NGOs were invited. One, on 26th was organised by Sarawak Sovereignty Movement where three speakers involved, one was Sabah’s politician, one from Sabah’s NGO and a Sarawak academician from International Islamic University who discussed the topic of The Malaysian Agreement 1963, attended by a few federal officers included one from Sabah BN Federal Minister’s representative attended the seminar.  Another was on 27th were Datuk Dr Jeffrey Kitingan of the STAR Sabah, Datuk Yong Teck Lee President of SAPP, one Puan Lina Soo from Sarawak NGO and one from Peninsula discussed about the Past, Present and the Future of Malaysia.

There had been great enthusiasm on the autonomy issues in the two separate seminars.

In my observation, its only fair to suggest that cooperation between the two states is a must, and this one of the viable strategists that could be used by the two States Amde Sidik, said

Sarawak would be having its State general election in the 2016, but it doesn’t distract the cooperation.

Sabah must adopt Sarawak’s style, to eliminate any opposition parties, which are not local based. Their promise about autonomy isn’t the same as local parties, and in fact they are only to hijack and confused rural voters.

By Hj Amde Sidik, Director of PIPPA -Progressive Institute of Public Policy Analysis, Sabah